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Friday, April 15, 2016

Getting ready to welcome the long-awaited

My family was finally going to join up with me in Australia on the 16th of April. I am very happy about it. To make things even happier for me, they were bringing the QNIX QX2710 display with them. I had to leave it back in Sri Lanka as I could not fit it in the weight allowance.

There was not much to arrange really. I had all the things I needed to get the PC up and running.

But then I had this idea for the longest of times. I wanted to do a proper job of cable management. External cable management that is.

First thing was to get a long power board where I could install on the back of the desk. There was a thin board on the back which allowed screwing a power board onto without revealing anything. I bought one with four surge protected outlets from Coles supermarket and a packet of nails from the Two Dollar shop. The power board had the necessary hooks on the back to be mounted vertically. I did not have a drill but I managed to somehow screw it up. Now only one cable came out of the desk.

It was better than what I have done in Japan, but what should I do with the cables? I could tape them up to the back of the desk, but it would have been irritatingly difficult if I had to do some PC maintenance. There had to be a better and easier way to do it.

This is the best I could do when I was in Japan

I am subscribed to the YouTube channel of TechSource where the host shows cool and tidy desk setups with very tidy cable management. I wanted to do something like that. Most people who had sent photos of their nice looking desk setups were using one particular item that made things so much easy. It is called the IKEA Signum Cable Management Cradle. I have an IKEA near my apartment and it had it for $20. Yes, again, not cheap, considering the desk only cost me $39 from Kmart. But I decided to buy it.

First of all, I had to know if it would fit. I checked the spacing behind the desk, now with the power board installed, and it just appeared to fit. Yes, it would fit.

Then I had to know if I could actually install it without a drill. The instructions specifically mentioned the need of one. But after looking at the screws that came with it, it appeared to me that it would require no more effort than the installation of the power board. So we are all good to go.

On Friday, the day before my family was supposed to arrive in Australia, I went to IKEA to buy the Signum cradle. In Australia, shopping centers and big malls are open till 9pm on Thursday and Friday. So I did not have to leave work early to get there.

I was able to locate the cradle pretty quickly. I brought it home and unpacked it. The screws that came with it were actually easier to screw in because of the shape. They had very pointy ends. I managed to install it in no time.

This is the finished desk. Everything looks nice and tidy. No dangly cables from the back. Nothing on the floor. My kid does not have easy access to the cables now.

(To see the desk after I have the desktop PC up and running, check this link out.)